<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">
<head>
<title>Naming Conventions</title>
</head>
<body>

<h1>Naming Conventions</h1>

<p>While this may sound like a small detail, clear method naming is important to provide an API that developers familiar with event-based programming can pick up quickly.</p>

<p>Since the idea of a method call maps very neatly onto that of a received event, all event handlers are simply methods named after past-tense verbs. All class names are descriptive nouns, designed to mirror the is-a relationship of the abstractions they implement. All requests for notification or transmission are present-tense imperative verbs.</p>

<p>Here are some examples of this naming scheme:</p>

<ul>
<li>An event notification of data received from peer:
<code class="python">dataReceived(data)</code></li>
<li>A request to send data: <code class="python">write(data)</code></li>
<li>A class that implements a protocol: <code class="python">Protocol</code></li>
</ul>

<p>The naming is platform neutral. This means that the names are equally appropriate in a wide variety of environments, as long as they can publish the required events.</p>

<p>It is self-consistent. Things that deal with TCP use the acronym TCP, and it is always capitalized. Dropping, losing, terminating, and closing the connection are all referred to as <q>losing</q> the connection. This symmetrical naming allows developers to easily locate other API calls if they have learned a few related to what they want to do.</p>

<p>It is semantically clear. The semantics of dataReceived are simple: there are some bytes available for processing. This remains true even if the lower-level machinery to get the data is highly complex.</p>

</body>
</html>
